


(and i said what about) breakfast at tiffany's

by somethingdifferent



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, F/M, but told over a few parts, pls do not hate me i have fallen prey to This Ship, so this will be not too long, this started off as a oneshot and it quickly spiraled out of control
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-22
Updated: 2017-03-04
Packaged: 2018-09-26 06:05:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9870743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somethingdifferent/pseuds/somethingdifferent
Summary: The first time he meets Veronica Lodge -Back up.The first time heseesVeronica Lodge - he cannot fucking stand her.[jughead/veronica; canon au where jughead temporarily moves into the lodges' guest room ft. the rarest of pairs that i cannot get over]





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so all of this are basically the sum total of my feelings re: episode 4, where Jughead seems to actively dislike Veronica. Why does nobody talk about this! It demands discussion! Also I feel like I am the only person on this ship so I am having a grand ol time steering it.
> 
> Title taken from the ulta-cheesy 90s teen song "Breakfast At Tiffany's" by Deep Blue Something
> 
> Also the song for this couple is clearly Play With Fire by The Rolling Stones.

> It is very seldom that a person loves anyone they cannot in some way envy.
> 
> ** TRUMAN CAPOTE **

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Stop glaring," Kevin says, and Jughead startles.

"What?"

"You've been glaring for, like, thirty seconds." Kevin lifts a fry from Veronica's plate and pops it into his mouth, smirking. "I'm worried you're going to get a headache."

Jughead scowls, continuing to glare at the window, but that only serves to brighten Kevin's mood. The lines in his forehead deepen, and Kevin outright laughs at him.

"Calm yourself, babes," he says, inclining his head toward the glass where they can both see Veronica walking - no, not walking, more like sidling, striding, _strutting_ \- toward Betty and Archie. Her black hair is lit up in red from the neon sign and it makes her look strange, it makes her look like a moving photograph. "That's just how Veronica is."

Jughead turns back to Kevin, staring at him blankly. "Who said anything about Veronica?"

Kevin rolls his eyes, but says nothing else.

 

 

 

 

The first time he meets Veronica Lodge -

Back up.

The first time he _sees_ Veronica Lodge - he cannot fucking stand her.

As soon as she walks into the school - sidles, strides, struts, what-the-fuck-ever - she has everyone turning their heads. Veronica Lodge Of New York City, With The Burberry Scarf And The Father In Prison. Veronica dresses and moves and speaks in the language of money, and Jughead sees her and all at once decides he cannot stand her.

By the time they first meet she only confirms what he had initially suspected. She holds her hand out to him, prim and proper, superficially polite. But rather than standing up to let him in the booth or scooching over to give him space, she remains firmly planted in her spot, that brilliant, artificial white smile fixed on her face.

Jughead catalogues this in his mind, filing it away in box he's labeled _Residents of Riverdale - Misc._ and hurdles over the back of the booth to get in. She doesn't deserve her own cabinet, like Betty and Archie do. She's not that important. And if he's learned nothing else from living in Riverdale, it is this: if no one gives you space, make it yourself.

"Veronica Lodge," she says, her voice delicate and crisp. The language of money. Jughead wants to know what exactly his two best friends see in this girl.

"Jughead Jones," he says, "the Third."

 

 

 

 

Betty and Veronica have become something of a dynamic duo, which means Jughead keeps finding himself in Veronica's vicinity whether he likes it or not. It is mostly fine, mostly amiable, until the rare moments that Betty or Archie or both leave them alone together.

"So," Veronica says, stirring her strawberry milkshake. When Jughead says nothing, she tries again. "What's up, Jug?"

He sighs briefly. "Nothing."

She pauses, as if suddenly thinking of something. "Is Jughead your real name?"

"Yes," he deadpans. "My mother and father decided they wanted to name me Jughead. It's on my birth certificate and everything."

Veronica narrows her eyes at him. "Alright, you physical embodiment of the concept of "teenage wasteland," you try making conversation with me. Otherwise we'll just sit here in awkward - nay, _tragically_ awkward - silence."

"I'm good with silence." Jughead smiles, stabbing a french fry into his milkshake rather viciously. "As long as it's with you, Ronnie, my dear."

"Oh, great comeback. How many joke books for the unbearably hip did you read before you found that one?"

"I thought of it all by myself actually. Not all of us need to gorge ourselves on pop culture before we find a sense of humor."

Veronica face falls, but almost as soon as he notices this she smiles again, waving Betty over to their table. Jughead does not feel bad, not even for a minute. Not even for a heartbeat.

He tells himself this, anyway.

 

 

 

 

At lunch, he calls her "knockoff Audrey Hepburn," and she bristles, she hisses, she spits back, "knockoff James Dean," and he wants to genuinely laugh but stops short of actually doing it.

Betty grins triumphantly at her success in creating a friendship where a friendship daren't exist. "I knew you two would get along."

Neither of them corrects her on this mistake, but they both smile meanly across the cafeteria table. Jughead hears Kevin mutter to Veronica, "Kitty, retract those claws."

Veronica smiles innocently at Betty, all _sure we do don't we just love each other_ , but she still kicks Jughead underneath the table. This time, he does laugh, spitting Coca-Cola into his glass.

 

 

 

 

The night after they close the Twilight Drive-In, Jughead spends hours walking around Riverdale, trying not to fall asleep on his feet. Eventually, he ends up in a booth at Pop's typing on his laptop and nursing a milkshake because he needs to justify his existence there. It's close to one when Veronica walks in, and it's really kind of unfair, that she can walk into so many places and make it seem cinematic, effortless. Like she has her own personal slow-motion machine.

She falters a little bit on her way to the counter when she sees Jughead there, but almost immediately regains her footing, flagging down her mother with a wave of her hand.

Jughead keeps typing, and he does not look up. Only once or twice does he steal a glance. Maybe a few times more than that. Veronica and her mother are arguing in hushed tones, Veronica's hands closed into tight fists and her face flushed. Finally, Mrs. Lodge says loud enough for him to hear, "We'll talk about this at home, mija," and turns on her heel to bring a plate of burgers to a table full of drunk teenagers.

Veronica runs a hand through her hair as if to smooth it, but all it does is make her seem more disheveled. She notices him staring and snaps, "What the hell do you want, Jughead?"

"Nothing," he says. "I don't want anything at all from you."

Her face crumples, and for an overlong moment it seems like Veronica might cry. Jughead prays she doesn't, prays she'll turn _heart of glass ice witch_ again, and eventually she does.

Her heels click loud on the tiled floors, and with a jingle of the door she is out of the restaurant and practically sprinting to her car. Jughead watches the progress and types. _The rich girl_ , deletes it, _The raven-haired girl_ , deletes it, _Veronica Lodge_   _was the poorest little rich girl anyone had ever seen_ , deletes it again.

_Veronica Lodge_ , he types at last, _was an ice queen. Only despite her best efforts, she remained the kind who could shatter at any moment._

_And I wanted to make her shatter,_ he types, and then deletes the sentence before the thought can fully form.

 

 

 

 

Eventually, Pop seems to realize Jughead has no other place to go, and one night, at three in the morning, he drops a set of keys on top of Jughead's laptop and murmurs, "There's a couch in my office. I brought some sheets from home."

Jughead nods at him, blinking fast. He feels like the Grinch, his heart growing several sizes too big, until he blinks again and suddenly notices Mrs. Lodge watching the interaction from behind the counter.

He grabs the keys, clenching them in his fist until he can feel the ridges digging into his skin.

"Not a word," he says to Mrs. Lodge over the cash register. He does not want to plead with her, but he thinks maybe she understands now just how far you can fall without a safety net.

Mrs. Lodge just takes the few dollars he has waiting in his palm. "Not a word about what?" she says.

 

 

 

 

"Which is better," Veronica says one day, waxing poetic over her burger and fries while she watches her mother flit from table to table, smiling bright and fake for the dollar-fifty she gets in tips, "to have had money and lost it or to never have had it at all?"

Jughead stares at her, and he hates her so strongly in that moment it almost blinds him. "What a stupid fucking question," he says, the words ground out through his teeth.

 

 

 

 

The first rule of documentary filmmaking, or nonfiction writing, or any kind of so-called "objective" media, is to edit yourself out as much as possible. When Jughead first read _In Cold Blood_ , he was struck by that, how Capote had strived to eliminate himself from the story. Later, he read criticisms of the book, accounts that Capote had invented, exaggerated, duped his audience into believing something that was half fiction. Jughead was disappointed at this - that real life could not, after all, hold a candle to art. That he could not eliminate himself, his biases, entirely.

Jughead rewrites the scene in the diner, the scene where he first meets Veronica Lodge. There were four people in the booth. Try as he might, he can't pretend he wasn't there.

_Veronica Lodge,_ he types in Pop's office, the computer propped up against his bent knee. _Veronica Lodge has nothing to do with Jason Blossom, or anything else in Riverdale. Veronica Lodge told me at lunch one day weeks later that I looked like a knockoff James Dean and then she kicked me underneath the table. Veronica Lodge has a way of inserting herself into stories where she doesn't belong._

_Veronica Lodge,_ he types, and then he deletes the whole damn paragraph.

 

 

 

 

Veronica always sits next to Jughead when Archie is there, and always sits across from him when Archie isn't. Jughead informs Veronica of this observation one day at lunch, while they're waiting for Archie to return from the bathroom and for Betty to get back from office hours with their science teacher. Veronica's eyebrows raise a little, like she's impressed. According to Cheryl, Veronica's eyebrows are very good ("At once Frida Kahlo and Salma Hayek playing anyone besides Frida Kahlo," she'd said), but Jughead does not focus on these so much as he does on the darkness of her eyes, her hair.

They are nearly black, those eyes. It makes her face more distinct. A lesser man might write a sonnet about her face, maybe try his hand at something more Neruda-esque (even though Veronica doesn't speak Spanish, something he'd listened to her talk about weeks ago to Betty).

"Look at you, Sherlock Holmes," she drawls after he points out his Archie observation. "You've cracked the case of me trying not to upset Betty."

"I just think it's interesting," Jughead says. The fact that they're sitting next to each other makes it seem perfectly natural for him to angle his body toward hers, his legs splayed out while hers are crossed primly. Properly. "Why go through the effort? We both know that Archie doesn't want Betty like that."

"Because -" Veronica starts off too loud, too annoyed, but quickly lowers her voice again. "Because even if that's true, which I am not saying it always will be, I'm not going to be the bitch who fucks the guy her best friend has been crushing on for years. That's not me anymore."

"Oh, so that  _was_ you at some point." He clicks his tongue, as if in disapproval. "You know what they say about old habits."

"No, but I do know what they say about people who can't shut their fucking - oh hey, Betty!" Veronica stands up to hug Betty, and Betty's hand taps lamely on her back.

"I just saw you like two hours ago," she laughs, taking the seat across from Jughead.

"But we really missed you," Veronica replies, and after that she doesn't look at Jughead for the rest of the period.

Jughead, though - it's like he can't keep his eyes away.

 

 

 

 

There is something wrong with the book.

He realizes it when he reads what he has so far, the sum total of his hours of effort, hours of observation and research and erasing himself from the story. It's total shit: stream of consciousness even Jack Kerouac would call self-indulgent, and more boring than any Johnny Depp movie post- _Pirates of the Caribbean_.

"Well," the English teacher says when Jughead explains his problem, "it's difficult to write a book about something as it's happening. Because you don't know what will be important about it until it's already over. You tend to include a lot of extraneous details that way."

"What do I do then?"

The teacher shrugs, purses his lips like,  _what are you gonna do_. "Just keep writing. Figure out what it is after it's finished."

 

 

 

 

_Betty Cooper_ , he writes. _Archie Andrews. Kevin Keller. Cheryl Blossom. Jason Blossom. Veronica Lodge._

After a moment of thought, he adds in, _Jughead Jones III_.

 

 

 

 

Veronica is always wearing something expensive. In spite of the scandal surrounding her father, in spite of her mother's fall from grace, Veronica never looks anything less than flawless. She makes sipping a strawberry milkshake look elegant. She makes all of them look a little less put together, just by comparison.

Betty says one day as they edit the newest paper, "It's not fair." She sighs, her shoulders slumping. "Veronica isn't fair."

Jughead knew she was referring to more than the money - that she was mostly referring to Archie, how he had instantly fallen for her.

"So it goes," he says, and Betty throws a pencil at his head. Her aim is true, and the pencil sticks him in the cheek before clattering on the desk.

"Don't quote Vonnegut at me." She tosses her ponytail over her shoulder, marking something down on her paper. "What do you think of Veronica, anyway? You two don't seem to talk much."

He shrugs. "She's alright, I guess."

Betty nods, her eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Mhm."

"So she's not my best friend, so what. We don't all have to be so chummy with each other, Elizabeth."

"Aha!" Betty exclaims. "So you _don't_ like her!"

"I never said that," Jughead protests momentarily, but immediately gives up on the charade. "Okay, so I don't like her."

Betty sputters. "Why not?"

Jughead shrugs again, this time more dramatically, shoulders touching his ears, his hands open, as if to say _beats me_. Betty huffs, but she doesn't ask him about Veronica for the rest of the afternoon.

 

 

 

 

One night, he forgets to lock the door to the office. Jughead knows Veronica is something of an amateur sleuth, he knows her mother works in the diner every day, and he knows Veronica has noticed how often and how late he stays in his regular booth. Yet he forgets to lock the door.

So really, it's his fault.

He's writing his novel on the couch when Veronica comes in. He sits up immediately, nearly throwing his laptop across the room in the process. Her eyes flit from his shoes on the floor, to his backpack in the corner, to the blanket and pillow he has draped over his body. He can practically see the gears shifting in her head, can pinpoint the exact moment that she realizes what he's doing there.

"Jughead," she says quietly, "tell me this isn't what I know it is."

"Okay," he says. "I am not living here."

She sighs heavily, her hand flitting to her forehead. "Alright, Jughead. Alright." Veronica crosses the room, and in spite of his protests she sits next to him. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry. This - this has got to suck."

Jughead actually laughs at that, a real laugh. It surprises her as much as it does him, by her expression. For once, he appreciates her inability to sugarcoat. "Yeah, it really does."

"Okay." Veronica claps her hands, standing up. "Come on, we're going."

"Uh, no thanks, I'm good."

Veronica crosses her arms, unimpressed. "Uh, no, you're not. So here's what's going to happen: I'm going to buy us some burgers and fries because I am fucking starving, we're going to take our food to go, and then you're going to sleep in a real bed tonight." At Jughead's raised eyebrows, she groans. "Not in my room, perv. We have a guest room. You can stay there for now.

"And," she adds, tapping her heel on the ground, "if you don't come with me I'll have to raise all kinds of hell."

"What will you do, pray tell?"

"I'll figure something out, Forsythe Pendleton." When he blanches, Veronica smiles. "Oh yeah. County birth records. I believe that's what the kids these days call a checkmate."

She waves at him to follow, and after a minute of pondering whether or not any of this is worth it, Jughead follows her out the door.

 

 

 

 

He calls her a knockoff Audrey Hepburn again at lunch, and this time she laughs before calling him knockoff James Dean.

Betty grins, excited at them seemingly getting along, and Jughead rolls his eyes. He continues typing, trying to think of synonyms for raven: pitch-black, midnight, onyx, sable, ebony.

Across the table from him, the sloe-eyed, sable-haired, crimson-lipped girl catches his eye and smiles conspiratorially.

 

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am literally disgusting @god @god y hast thou abandoned me
> 
> this is the next chapter ft. copious amounts of fluff that i am ashamed to call my own. there will probs be only one more after this and it will probs be posted in the next few days
> 
> pls do not judge me i am but a poor fish in the tide of My Emotions About This Ship

> Home is where you feel at home. I'm still looking.
> 
> ** TRUMAN CAPOTE **

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The first week he meets her, Veronica starts to talk about New York City at lunch. Kevin asks her about the glamour, asks her about where she went and what she wore and who she saw. Veronica smiles, humoring him (Jughead will realize this only later: that she was humoring them).

One of her distant relations, she tells them, was the New York City mayor, John Purroy Mitchel. The Lodges, she says, were one of the most respected families in Manhattan, Upper East Side royalty. They had museum memberships for the Met, the MoMA, the Frick, the Guggenheim, etcetera, etcetera. Here she waves her hands in a circle, demonstrating how the list could go on and on. She loved to shop in SoHo, go to see a film in Greenwich Village, eat dinner with her parents at their apartment.

"Weren't the Madoffs New York City royalty?" Jughead asks, smirking.

Veronica's smile is thin, and her laugh is brittle.

(Later, he will think about this conversation and cringe.

But that's only later.) 

 

 

 

 

He always tries to wait as long as possible before he makes his way toward Veronica's apartment. Every night, there is a plate of something left waiting on the counter: steak and potatoes, spaghetti, tacos, salmon and salad with vinaigrette dressing. He doesn't know if Veronica or her mother leaves it there for him, but he doesn't ask. He eats the food in the dark kitchen, not turning on the lights so that no one will come into the room and see him there. In the morning, he wakes up earlier than either of the Lodges, sneaking out of the door to wait for the school to open.

Veronica never makes any mention of his living situation to anyone. She never even talks about it with him.

One night, he runs into her outside of the bathroom, and it seems to startle both of them. The light from the room spills into the hallway, casting Veronica half in shadow when she looks up at him.

They mutter apologies, voices overlapping, until finally Veronica bites the bullet and heads in, shutting the door. Jughead presses his fist against his eyes, breathing deeply, before he turns on his heel and walks back into the guest room.

The thing that embarrasses him most about the encounter is that she saw him without his hat.

 

 

 

 

The novel doesn't make any sense. He tells the English teacher this, his words jumbling together in confusion and frustration.

"It doesn't line up," he explains, "none of it means anything, it's just a series of events strung together. Scenes in total isolation from each other. There's no running theme."

"C'est la vie," the teacher says. "Such is life."

"I know what c'est la vie means," Jughead scoffs, more offended by that than anything else. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"Mr. Jones," he sighs, "have you considered that your book doesn't make any sense to you because, right now, your life doesn't make sense to you? Sometimes, no matter how hard we try, there are no running themes."

Jughead shifts in his uncomfortable chair. "How boring."

"Again," the teacher replies, "c'est la vie."

 

 

 

 

She comes into the guest room sometime after midnight. Jughead is awake, of course; he has a tough time falling asleep in a bed so soft.

"Jughead," she whispers. "Are you awake?"

He gestures to the open laptop on his knees. "Clearly."

Veronica tiptoes into the room, taking a seat on the end of the bed without asking. Jughead can only stare at her. That seems to be a running theme, if nothing else. "Do you hate me?"

He blinks once, then twice. "No."

Her face breaks into an open smile. "Good." Then she leans forward as if to kiss him on the cheek, but he turns his head a little too quickly and her mouth lands somewhere at the corner of his mouth. He can feel her lips soften against his face, her fingers tucked under his chin. This close, she smells like strawberries, and his eyes flicker shut.

Once she leans back again, Jughead furrows his brow. "What was that?"

"It was nothing," she says. "I just want us to be friends."

"We can be friends," he replies slowly. "Maybe don't kiss your friends, right?"

"Don't worry about that, Jug," she snorts, getting up. "You would know if I'd wanted to kiss you for real."

He nods, watching her as she walks - still not the right verb - to the door, waving her fingers at him in goodbye. Jughead tugs his beanie down over his forehead, exhaling.

_Veronica Lodge,_ he types once she leaves, _makes no goddamn sense._

 

 

 

 

 

**UNTITLED RIVERDALE NOVEL: ** ** ORIGINAL TEXT FOR JUGHEAD JONES III'S CAST OF CHARACTERS **

_ARCHIE ANDREWS_ \-  15 going on 16. Redheaded. Unexpectedly handsome. Torn between two worlds, High School Musical style. What all adults would call "a good kid."

_BETTY COOPER_ \-  15 going on 16. Blonde. Very pretty in a girl next door kind of way, but practically invisible to most high school boys. In love with Archie Andrews. Secret dark side.

_VERONICA LODGE_ \-  16\. Sloe-eyed, raven-haired, crimson-lipped. Absolutely fucking gorgeous and knows it. Narcissistic, wealthy, and arrogant. Not-so-secret dark side. Possible (?) light side (to be investigated).

_JUGHEAD JONES III_ \-  16\. Dark-haired. Perpetually wearing a crown-shaped beanie. Okay looking. Mostly just part of the background.

 

 

 

 

At a table in Pop's, there were four of them: on one side, there was a blonde girl and a redheaded boy; on the other side, there was a raven-haired girl and there was him. Later, Jughead writes all of it down, exactly as it happened. Not one detail spared. Not one person left out.

Veronica steals french fries from his plate and laughs when he shields them with his arms. She takes a sip from his chocolate milkshake, out of his straw, and when he goes to protect that too she snatches a handful of fries and dumps them on her plate.

"Sucker," she says, grinning, and Jughead smiles back.

 

 

 

 

"She's gorgeous," Archie tells Jughead over a burger at Pop's. This is when Veronica first comes into town, into all of their lives, whether anybody (Jughead) wants her to or not. "I mean, she's like nobody else I've ever seen."

"That doesn't mean much, Arch," Jughead replies. He bites down on his burger, speaking with a mouthful of food. "You haven't seen all that many people."

 

 

 

 

She sneaks into the guest room a few more times after the first time. Most of the time, it seems like she just wants the company; once or twice, it seems like she actually wants to talk to him.

The third time it happens, a few weeks after he starts sleeping there, just as he's getting comfortable being in her apartment, Veronica lays down on his bed. She does it casually, like she belongs there. Her bare foot keeps brushing against his leg as he writes, and he tries not to let it distract him.

"Workin' on your novel?" Veronica says suddenly, after a few minutes of silence.

Jughead nods, glancing in her direction. Veronica has her arms crossed above her head, and the front of her pajama top is riding up, showing an inch of smooth skin. He looks away quickly.

"Am I in it?" she asks.

He nods again, this time careful not to look over at her.

Veronica sits up, leaning over his shoulder to peer at what he has written. "Are you writing this conversation that we're having right now?"

"I'm trying to include everything."

"I just mean, this -" and she gestures to the room, to him and herself, "isn't all that exciting, Jug. Nothing's even happening."

"I'm trying to include everything. Just figure out what's important afterwards."

She huffs. "That's boring. You should spice it up a bit. Sex, drugs, rock 'n roll. Pick your poison."

"It's nonfiction." Jughead sighs, his fingers stilling over the keyboard. "I can't just make things up. I can't _In Cold Blood_ this."

Veronica titters. "I'll just do it for you then," she says, and that is when she grabs his face and kisses him. 

His laptop almost crashes to the ground, but at the last moment Jughead manages to catch it.

"What was that for?" he nearly wheezes when she breaks away. He can feel the imprint of her lips on his. He can taste her grapefruit chapstick.

"Dramatic effect," she says. The strap of her shirt has slid halfway down her arm, so he pushes it back up.

This, he realizes immediately, was either the best idea he's ever had, or the worst. As soon as he touches her again, it's like - he can't decide on a metaphor. Jughead was never a fan of how passion is written in novels, but it still feels like a dam breaking. As soon as he touches her, neither of them can stop themselves from rushing forward and kissing again.

Jughead feels stupid, idiotic, out of control. He suddenly understands how Archie must feel with - well, everybody.

Veronica slides her tongue in his mouth, and he groans. He retaliates by slipping his hands under her tank top, pressing his fingernails against her back, until she gasps.

They're almost completely horizontal by the time Jughead fully realizes what he's doing. He jumps away from her, leaping off the bed and standing up. His hat had fallen off when Veronica ripped her fingers through his hair, so he retrieves it from the ground and puts it back on.

Veronica's head drops back onto the pillow, her eyes shut tight. Her face is flushed, and she breathes heavily. "What the fuck," she says.

"Right," Jughead replies. "What the fuck."

 

 

 

 

The longer his novel gets, the less it makes sense to him. Somehow he changed from a silent witness, to an objective acquaintance, to - he doesn't even know what to call what he is now.

"This is uncharted territory," he says to Veronica. "I'm not sure how my book will end."

"Personally," she replies, flouncing back on the bed, "I think it'll end only with our joint mass-murder/suicide, like in  _Heathers_."

Jughead laughs harder than he should at that.

 

 

 

 

It happens again. They have some kind of unspoken agreement not to tell anybody, because there is no scene of discovered betrayal with Archie, no overly shocked gasp from Betty. Most nights, after Mrs. Lodge has fallen asleep, Veronica goes to the guest room. Sometimes she climbs on top of him as soon as she sees him, and sometimes she talks and talks until he tugs her forward and silences her with his mouth.

Somehow, he seems to like whatever it is he has with her. The few times he'd kissed girls before Veronica, it had been okay - not earth-shattering, not terribly disappointing. Just mundane. He hadn't seen the appeal, mostly. Archie always acted like kissing a girl (and then feeling up a girl, and then fingering a girl, and then fucking a girl) is the end-all, be-all of the world. Jughead never understood that perspective.

But whatever it is with Veronica - he likes that well enough. He likes it enough not to stop, even when Archie talks to him about how much he likes Veronica, even when Betty sighs gently and wishes aloud that boys noticed her as much as they notice Veronica.

Even then, he doesn't stop any of it. He doesn't even try. 

 

 

 

 

"What are you listening to?" Veronica asks him when he takes off his headphones. "I've got a bet going with Kevin that it's exclusively German death metal."

Jughead leans over, allowing her to see the screen of his laptop.

"Fuck you," she laughs. "I owe him 20 dollars now, I hope you're happy."

"Just tell him it was Die Apokalyptischen Reiter."

"Seriously?" she says, raising her eyebrows.

He shrugs. "As long as you buy me a burger with your winnings." 

 

 

 

"Like the _great indie cinema filmmaker_ Paul Thomas Anderson said," Veronica begins at the diner, and Jughead gives her the middle finger while Betty and Kevin laugh. Under the table, he inches his left hand up her skirt, watching with satisfaction when she stumbles over her next words.

"Not fair," she says later, in the hall outside of the bathroom. The lights are dim, the hallway tucked in a strange little corner of the restaurant where most people don't go. His fingers are between her thighs, his mouth on her neck. "You're not fair."

He huffs out a laugh. "The phrase 'indie cinema filmmaker' is totally redundant, you know," he says. Veronica clutches his shoulder hard enough to make a mark, but she doesn't tell him to stop.

 

 

 

 

The first time he meets Veronica Lodge -

Back up.

The first time he _sees_ Veronica Lodge - he cannot fucking stand her.

Jughead doesn't know when he stopped hating her, or why, or maybe if he never did to begin with.

C'est la vie.

 

 

 

 

Once, while Mrs. Lodge is on a trip to New York, Veronica tells him she's never actually seen a Quentin Tarantino movie.

"Okay, _Pulp Fiction_  and _Kill Bill_ are obviously his masterpieces, but _Inglourious Basterds_ can be pretty fantastic, too - or should you start of with _Reservoir Dogs_ , that one is definitely more accessible than the others -"

"Jughead!" she interrupts him. "Make an executive decision."

He finally settles on _Reservoir Dogs_ , figuring she should start off slow. For the first ten minutes, he glances at her, trying to gauge her reaction until she tells him to stop.

Once they settle into watching the movie, Veronica wraps his arm around her, leaning back against his chest, and he does nothing to discourage her from it. Even worse, when she tries to hold his hand, he actually intertwines their fingers together.

 

 

 

 

He records all of this in his word document the next morning, while Veronica is still asleep in the bed.

When he rereads what he has so far, Jughead says out loud, "What the hell?" and this startles Veronica into consciousness.

"Is all my dreaming at an end," she says, and blinks blearily at him. "Or do you still wait for me, dream giver?"

"Shh, shh," he murmurs, "stop quoting Pocahontas. It is doing very little to convince me you're still sleeping."

"I'm sleeping," she mutters, stuffing her head back in the pillow. "I'm sleeping and I'm dreaming."

"About what?" he asks absently, still staring at the computer, trying to decipher the meaning of the scene he has written with all the effort of a thousand Tom Hanks's in a thousand Da Vinci Codes.

"Milkshakes," Veronica says softly, her voice getting quieter as she falls back asleep. Jughead looks at her, and suddenly there is a flip somewhere in his stomach. "Milkshakes and burgers," she hums.

 

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am terrible this is super cheesy pls do not hate me!!!! this is the end of this fic i hope it was okay!!!! mayhaps i shall write more for this ship in the future!!!!!! ok goodbye

> Still, when all is said, somewhere one must belong: even the soaring falcon returns to its master's wrist.
> 
> ** TRUMAN CAPOTE**

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In her car, while they wait for Betty in the rain, Veronica writes messages on the fogged up glass.

"Are you five?" he says, and she hushes him.

"I'm concentrating." Carefully she writes, _C U IN HELL JUGHEAD_.

"Not if I see you there first," he shoots back.

Jughead watches while Veronica draws a smile, a heart, a cloud. She writes in all capitals _I O U 1 BURGER_ , and he laughs. Veronica leaves it there, even when Betty gets to the car and opens the door.

"Um," she says, "what are those?"

"Reminders," Veronica replies, moving the gear shift. She glances over at Jughead. "That I'm going to see Jughead in hell and I owe him a burger."

"The two are not necessarily mutually exclusive," Jughead adds as he looks back at Betty, and Veronica grins wide.

Betty furrows her eyebrows together. "Interesting," she mutters while staring at Jughead. "Very interesting."

 

 

 

 

Cheryl Blossom figures it out first, which of course she does. Jughead should have known something was up, because Cheryl Blossom actually comes up to him and starts talking.

The conversation turns on him pretty quickly, of course.

"So you're fucking Veronica," she says casually. "Does Archie know?"

"What?" Jughead feels stupid again, caught off his feet. Do girls normally make guys feel this stupid? Why does anybody kiss anyone else at all, ever? "No I'm not."

"Don't try to hide it, darling. My little birds are everywhere, a la _Game of Thrones_ , and they are reporting one: an increased flow of conversation between you and Riverdale's very own Eva Mendes; two: a sharp spike in moon-eyes made across the cafeteria table with nary a Betty nor an Archie in sight; and three, the most damning evidence of all: Ginger saw you - how shall we say - 'fingerbanging' her at Pop's."

Cheryl does little quotation marks when she says "fingerbanging" and somehow that is the worst part of all of it.

"What the fuck," Jughead says.

"Indeed," Cheryl replies smoothly, tossing her hair over her shoulder. "What the fuck. You should feel lucky that my source came to me first and didn't snap a pic right there and then. Otherwise - well, you're a writer. You can figure out what far-reaching repercussions a piece of gossip like that would have on you two lovebirds and literally everybody else in the school."

Jughead rolls his eyes so hard, that for a moment he worries they will get stuck. "What do you want, Cheryl?"

Cheryl shrugs. "Oh, nothing at the moment. I just want you to know that I know, and I am keeping a cap on this information. For now. And who knows? Maybe you'll decide you want to do me a favor sometime in the future. We'll just have to see the way the wind is blowing."

"I'll do you a favor? What, are you the Godfather now?"

She smirks. "Don't worry about it, you dear sweet idiot." She blows him a kiss, then walks away, shouting as she goes, "Just be more careful where you do your business, Jughead."

He stands there for a moment, dumbstruck, before shaking his head and walking in the opposite direction.

 

 

 

 

It is sometime around the millionth time that she comes to the guest room that he says anything. They're not even kissing, just laying down watching Law and Order: SVU because it's on the TV and through some unreasonable twist of fate they both love Law and Order. The episode they're watching is about internet pedophilia, and it has all the markers of greatness: late 90s slang, Christopher Meloni having a meltdown, fear-mongering about technology, even a dramatic PSA at the end warning against internet anonymity. Jughead imitates Detective Stabler slamming his hand on the interrogation table and Veronica bursts into fits of giggles, falling over on the bed, and Jughead kisses her suddenly and breaks away just as suddenly.

"This is weird," he says. "Is this weird? This is weird."

Veronica makes a face. "I'll have you know, I've never been weird in my whole life. You, on the other hand -"

"Seriously, though," Jughead says. "What is the deal? What is _this_ deal?" Oh god, he sounds like a crazy person.

"Oh god, you sound like a crazy person," Veronica says. "Stop freaking out, you'll make me freak out. What is the deal with what, exactly?"

Jughead flails helplessly for a moment. "With this," he says finally. "This whole thing we're doing, what's the deal? Why is this happening?"

Veronica stares at him. "I don't really know why, I guess." She leans back, folding her arms across her chest. "Do you want to stop?"

"No," he says too quickly. "I mean - I was just - Cheryl told me she knows. So I figured we should probably figure out the deal."

"Please stop calling it the deal, you sound like a gameshow host. And a pretty terrible one."

"Didn't you hear me?" Jughead says. "Cheryl knows about everything."

Veronica makes a little pssh sound, waving her hand. "Cheryl won't do anything. I'm basically the closest person she has to a friend." She frowns, considering this. "Which is actually very sad, if you think about it. By the way, was she fucking her brother? They were weirdly close, like, Lannister close."

"Probably not, but really anything is possible with that family." Jughead sighs, rubbing at his forehead. "You don't think it'll be a problem?"

"Definitely not," Veronica says confidently. "Now shut up, Olivia Benson is talking."

 

 

 

 

Here is a piece of information that puts something of a damper on things: It Is A Problem.

 

 

 

 

"Seriously," Kevin says as soon as Jughead opens his locker, "W. T. Fucking. F."

"If you add in the word 'fucking,' doesn't that defeat the purpose of the acronym?" Jughead replies.

"Have you not heard? Have. You. Not. _Heard?_ "

"Please don't do this to me, it is the first thing in the morning. Now tell me what I haven't heard."

"First of all, it's 8:45, so no, it's not. And second of all, you have not heard the best piece of gossip, possibly in the galaxy, definitely in the world, which is that you, Forsythe Pendleton Jones III, also commonly referred to as Jughead Jones III -"

"Did Veronica tell you that? Of course."

" _So_ not the point, let me finish: that you, Jughead Jones III, are fucking Veronica _fucking_ Lodge."

Jughead can practically feel the color drain from his face.

"Okay," Kevin says, "based on your reaction, clearly this is true. And clearly you have not taken the adequate steps to prepare for what would happen when this got out. So I would advise that you take a cue from our dear former President Bill Clinton and lie your ass off."

"What?" Jughead can hear the blood rushing in his ears. Is this a symptom of a heart attack? He may or may not be having a heart attack. He wonders if he should get the school nurse. "What are you talking about?"

"I'm saying you and Veronica should deny, deny, deny." Kevin looks around, dropping his voice. "Seriously though. I haven't had a class with Betty or Archie yet, so I can't say I know what they know, but you should get out ahead of this thing, and fast."

"Okay," Jughead says. "Okay, okay, you're probably right." Veronica won't want anyone to start thinking they're dating, after all. The princess and...him. What a fucking joke.

Kevin nods, half-turning to walk to his class, but Jughead stops him.

"Kevin," he says. "Why did you ask me first, why not Veronica?"

"Are you kidding?" Kevin says, smiling widely. "You're as easy to read as _Pat the Bunny_. If I'd asked Veronica about this, I never would've known if it was actually true."

 

 

 

 

He doesn't even go to the cafeteria at lunch. Jughead hides in a classroom, sitting across from the English teacher.

"Is everything alright, Mr. Jones?" he says. "You seem very...off today."

"Oh," Jughead says, faking a smile while he bites into his sandwich, "just your regular teenage drama."

The teacher nods slowly, lips pursed, but he doesn't ask Jughead about it again. In the word document, Jughead types out, _Maybe it's actually a good sign, knowing that in spite of someone being_ literally murdered _in this town, people can still be just as fascinated by the news that someone is sleeping with someone else._

_Or,_ he writes, _maybe not._

 

 

 

 

"What the fuck, Cheryl?" Jughead hisses just before math, leaning close to her as they wait outside the room. "What the _fuck_?"

"Darling," she grins, "I never said I'd wait forever."

 

 

 

 

In science, a few minutes before Veronica gets to class, Betty and Archie finally corner him. Before either of them say a word, Jughead says too loudly, "It's not true. It's - guys. It's not true."

They trade a glance. Betty rolls her eyes. "Jughead," she says, "no one is upset with you. It's just -"

"Weird," Archie supplies. "Super, super weird." Betty nudges him hard in the ribs. "It's the truth!"

"Anyway," she says, "if it's not true, that's cool, and if it is, that's also cool. But you should probably figure out what your story is before talking to anyone else. Because, you know, you have a face that basically makes the same expressions as a small child."

"Is my face really that bad?" Jughead says, quizzical. "Can everybody just tell immediately what I'm thinking all the time?"

And then Veronica walks in, and Jughead nearly dives for cover behind Betty.

"Yeah," Archie says, trying to hide a smirk. "Pretty much, dude."

 

 

 

 

By the end of the school day, he has received sixteen texts. He scrolls through the notifications as he waits on the bus, cringing more and more with each one. Most of them are from random acquaintances asking about the integrity behind those claims, but four of them are from Veronica.

_So I was wrong about Cheryl whoops_ (9:03 AM)

_Where are you????_   (12:24 PM) And three minutes later: _?????? So r u going 2 starve 2 death now??????? Am I so hideous that u would STARVE 2 death 2 avoid being linked 2 ME (exclamation point/question mark emoji)_ (12:27 PM)

The last one must've been sent during science, as he carefully avoided all possible eye contact and interaction throughout the period: _Seriously Jughead are you avoiding me? (_ 1:15 PM)

He closes the messages, pulling his hat down over his eyes. He will deal with this...later.

Later is good.

 

 

 

 

She finds him in Pop's office close to midnight. As soon as she opens the door, she walks over and sits next to him, close enough that he can feel her body heat. Jughead looks at her, waiting for it - for her to yell, cry, tell him he's the worst person she's ever met, actually, come to think of it - but it doesn't really happen that way.

"You know," Veronica says, "if your big plan is to pretend nothing ever happened between us, then you probably shouldn't be making such a big deal out of ignoring me. That's the most obvious thing you can do. You might as well stand on a table and announce it if you're going to be that clearly suspicious."

"I'm not ignoring you," Jughead says. "Well, not you specifically, anyway."

"Oh really? Because it felt like you were ignoring me, specifically. Considering the circumstances." Veronica is looking at her fingernails, picking at them with a surgical precision. Jughead watches her and feels...strange.

"I just - I was not prepared to answer any questions yet." He nudges her in the side. "That's why I asked you, remember?"

She sighs, the tiniest hint of a smile tilting up the corners of her mouth. "Okay, maybe you were right. But, _really_ , Jughead. You really skipped lunch and ducked under a table to avoid me and told everybody that everything was a lie and Cheryl is a liar - which may be true, at times, but not in this instance."

"What did you want me to say? 'Yes, Archie, even though you did, in fact, call dibs, I decided to go ahead and start hooking up with Veronica fucking Lodge.' 'Yes, Kevin, she really is a swell gal to have in bed, even if that's not what you're into.' 'Yes, Reggie, it has been confirmed that I kissed a living, breathing woman, so all the times you called me a fag in 8th grade makes you look pretty foolish right now.'"

Veronica raises an eyebrow. "Are you done? With the impressions?"

He considers this. "Yeah, I'm done."

"What I'm saying is: you really don't need to deny everything so much."

"And what should I do?"

She shrugs once before leaning back on the couch. "What do you want to do?"

Jughead leans back as well, turning his head slightly to face her. "What do _you_ want to do?"

"I asked you first."

"I asked you second."

Veronica laughs. "Oh my god, you are seriously the -"

This is when Jughead decides to say fuck it and kiss her. He imagines typing up those words briefly - _fuck it and kiss her_ \- before he focuses again on putting his fingers in Veronica's hair and opening her mouth with his mouth. He's always a little bit surprised every time this happens; he's always a little bit surprised by how much he wants to do this.

She breaks away first, muttering, "The worst person," before smiling and pressing her lips to his again.

 

 

 

 

"So what is... _the deal_?" Kevin asks at lunch, waggling his eyebrows with all the subtlety of Guy Fieri.

"Stop saying the deal," Jughead says, grinning. "You sound like a gameshow host."

Veronica laughs, looking at Jughead with open amusement in her eyes. "You stole my joke."

"I thought I got all of my humor from my joke book for the unbearably hip?"

"And from me, apparently."

"Please stop," Kevin interrupts. "You two were less annoying when you hated each other. Back me up, Bets."

"Yeah," Betty says, nodding solemnly, "way less annoying."

 

 

 

 

Later, in the guest room, he tucks his arm around her stomach, settling his mouth on her shoulders and breathing in her perfume.

"Go to sleep," Veronica murmurs.

"You go to sleep," Jughead shoots back quietly, pressing a kiss to the back of her neck before shutting his eyes.

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
